Amaranthine Rift

2.2 - Defense of Eston

17

APR/11

The crew returned to Eston with the Couriers in tow. Bellamy turned them over to Colonel Erryk and handed over the encrypted message with as much translation as you could figure out. Erryk gave him a wayfinder badge, created by House Sivis as a short-range messaging system. Range is about 30 miles for regular messages. Beyond that and it appears to work only twice a day. Alreon was moved to a different cell, with two replacements, Amarill and Peleon? a Tiefling Warlock.

The Rift’s cryptographers decoded more of the intercepted message- explaining that it wasn’t a troop surge towards Eston, but a massing of strike troops and skirmishers, intent on getting something or someone from the Cannith holdfast. Erryk heard through the grapevine that one of the Cannith engineers was showing off something new to the House Masters, but had no idea what it is.
Erryk said he’d talked to his Goblin troops about this Crimson Blade, to see if they knew anything.

In the downtime, Bellamy scouted out the defenses of the Cannith Tower in the center of town. Storm checked out the main defenses on the outskirts of town, then went to get drunk. Kat, on the other hand, trid to go to the bar but ran into her cousin Stevin instead. Stevin and his crew kicked Kat out, clearly angry with her and wanted nothing to do with her. Stevin’s father Roland helped found the Amaranthine Rift, but died a few years ago in the Siege of Shadukar, while on a rare contract with Karrnath.

The crew were sent on sentry duty that night. The Thranish strike force arrived that night, a day earlier than what you’d expected. The crew fought off quite a few members of the the strike team, including a battle comander of the Argent Fire, the same crew that ambushed Storm a few years back, right before he joined the Rift.
The strike force was really just a diversion, as Erryk discovered and relayed to Captain Bellamy. The real target was deeper in Eston- at the Cannith Tower. The intercepted message referred to a great power from the south- a new kind of Warforged brought up from southern Cyre. The team’s new target- find and secure Torrit D’Cannith, that Warforged’s creator.

Mayhem and confusion raged in the town, making it hard for the team to break through the crowds of people and get past the alchemical workshops, but they made it through with minimal injuries.

Outside the tower, Bellamy tried to save a Cannith house guard. He learned the general whereabouts of Torrit and the Warforged, but wasn’t able to save him. The team made their way through the Cannith hallways to the guest lodging, when Torrit D’Cannith was already bound and gagged. His Warforged fought vailiantly to save him, and the team took down the final strike team. Their leader, a gnome named Martrand, died in the battle. Although the other dead men appeared to be Thranish, there ain’t many gnomes in Thrane.